NCAA Stuck in Nevada : Enforcement: New state law says proceedings must conform to due process. Latest UNLV case taken off NCAA agenda.

A new law in Nevada targeting the NCAA enforcement process has paralyzed the NCAA’s ability to resolve the latest infractions case involving the Nevada Las Vegas basketball program, NCAA Executive Director Dick Schultz said.

“We’re dead in the water right now,” Schultz said. “We’re just at a standstill on that case.”

He indicated that the NCAA is considering taking legal action to challenge the statute, which requires that all NCAA enforcement proceedings involving Nevada institutions conform to due process of law--long a cause of UNLV basketball Coach Jerry Tarkanian.

“I don’t think the NCAA has ever sued a member institution, and we probably wouldn’t have to do that in this case,” Schultz said in an interview. “We’d probably sue the governor and the attorney general of the state.”

The Nevada due process measure was signed into law by Gov. Bob Miller, an avid UNLV booster, in April.

At the time, UNLV was responding to a letter of official inquiry from the NCAA charging the Rebel basketball program with rules violations in 29 areas. Many of the alleged violations focus on the school’s recruitment of former New York high school star Lloyd Daniels.

The matter was scheduled to be heard by the NCAA Committee on Infractions at the panel’s September meeting. However, the case has been moved off the committee’s agenda because of the Nevada statute, Schultz said.

Schultz said a lawyer for Tarkanian and another party to the UNLV case have sent letters to the NCAA, notifying the organization that it must comply with the Nevada law in dealing with the matter.

“The university is very cooperative,” Schultz said. “(UNLV officials) want to get this case over with, get it behind them. (The impasse) is because of Jerry’s attorney and another attorney who represents a person who is named (in the allegations) but not accused of anything. They’re both presenting basically the same argument based on the Nevada law.”

According to Schultz, the NCAA has not been able to hold a prehearing conference--an airing of the issues with the parties to the case before the infractions committee hearing--because of “the looseness of the law in defining what a proceeding is.”

Although UNLV legal counsel Brad Booke has been quoted as saying he believes the case can be heard by the committee in January, Schultz said: “The impression I have is that until certain things happen, that’s going to be difficult.”

The Nevada law contains several provisions that differ sharply from NCAA enforcement procedure. One such provision entitles the parties to a proceeding to confront and respond to all witnesses against them.

The law also contains a provision that entitles aggrieved parties in NCAA infractions cases to judicial review in state district court.

Under NCAA guidelines, the parties to a case learn the details of alleged rules violations and the identities of individuals making the charges in the letter of official inquiry. A school has 60 to 90 days to respond to such a letter.

NCAA infractions proceedings, however, do not call for the cross-examination of witnesses, a policy dictated by the organization’s lack of subpoena power.

Tarkanian’s attorney, Chuck Thompson, confirmed that he put the NCAA on notice last summer that it had to comply with the Nevada statute in dealing with the UNLV case.

“We have been making demands since July,” Thompson said, “and the first demand is that we have to be furnished evidence that (will be) utilized at the hearing. We think it is a minimal step. The NCAA keeps two-stepping us and saying we could go (to the NCAA office in Overland Park, Kan.,) and look (at the evidence), if we agree to this, agree to that.

“Nobody has agreed to give up any rights. As a result of that, nothing has happened. . . . The NCAA has got to understand that we are not backing down in any way. They are going to have to fully comply (with the law).”

Sparring over the law is the latest development in the long-running battle between the NCAA and Tarkanian, who has announced that he will leave UNLV at the end of the 1991-92 basketball season.

Tarkanian obtained injunctions in Las Vegas that allowed him to continue coaching in 1977, when the NCAA sought his suspension as a result of his connection to rules violations. Tarkanian’s case, based on the question of whether the NCAA should be considered a governmental body whose actions must meet constitutional due process requirements, went to the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in the NCAA’s favor.

As a final penalty stemming from that case, the infractions committee has barred UNLV from postseason competition and television appearances during the 1991-92 season.

Schultz noted that an infractions committee hearing involving a school in another state also has been delayed because a coach at the center of the case currently is working in Nevada.

Although Schultz declined to identify the case, sources familiar with the matter said it involves the University of New Mexico track and field program. That school’s former track and field coach, Del Hessel, is now at Nevada Reno.

Schultz said the NCAA is reluctant to move ahead with either case because of the threat of legal action that could be brought under the Nevada statute.

“We’re in the position right now where we don’t want to give anybody any excuse to take us to court in Nevada because we’ve had too many (negative) experiences there,” he said, referring to Tarkanian’s success in setting aside his suspension in Nevada courts. “We don’t feel there’s much of a way of winning something in state court. . . . So we’re just really taking a look to see what all of our options might be.”

Chief among the NCAA’s options, Schultz said, would be to seek federal legislation or to file a lawsuit.

“We either try to get some federal preemptive legislation or challenge the law (in court),” he said. “We think there are some real questions as to the legality of the law. . . . We think there are two or three pretty solid positions on which to proceed with some type of lawsuit. We’d be seeking an injunction, but that’s just a nice way of saying you’re suing the state.

“I think it will probably come down to one of those two (options), because we can’t ignore (an infractions matter), and we’re not going to just charge in and violate the law and end up in state court.”

Speaking of the NCAA’s predicament in general, Schultz said: “It’s bizarre. And it just shows what happens when the political process gets wound up in a voluntary association’s ability to carry on its business.”